to think the prospective father does not need to go to every IVF appointment?

[TheOccupier]

Someone who indirectly works for me has recently let me know his wife is having IVF treatment. For the last couple of months, he's been absent frequently, often failing to answer emails, working from home if he's online at all, and not doing site visits which are an important and necessary part of his role. I am unhappy about this.

I am technically his client, not his employer - he's a long-term agency worker by choice (he is senior-level, with fairly unique skills and a lot of responsibility). He has spoken to his agency director about the situation and apparently they have signed off on it. Nobody has proactively communicated with me. I am not based at the office he is meant to work from so I rarely see him in person and wasn't even aware that he'd switched to WFH - I noticed a lot of out of office messages but put these down to site visits. I only found out about the IVF last week when I put him on the spot by asking for the date when he was last at a particular site that he's meant to visit weekly (because there's been an issue there that he should have picked up) and it turned out it's been over 2 months. He then told me what's going on.

So:
a) AIBU to be annoyed about him neglecting his work responsibilities and think IVF is not an acceptable justification?

b) AIBU to believe that the husband/partner does not actually need to attend the majority of IVF appointments and that my agency worker is being unreasonable in acting as though he's the one trying to get pregnant, especially as this is affecting his performance at work?

I am aware that IVF involves a lot of appointments and many of these will be at very short notice. However, the only people I know well who have done IVF have been women using it to become single mothers by choice, and therefore they have just got on with it and done most appointments on their own, other than when they needed physical support/driving home etc. I can't believe most prospective fathers go to ALL the appointments and get away with it at work - especially given that even women don't have any legal right to time off for IVF up until implantation!

If I'm not being unreasonable, how should I handle this? The guy would be difficult to replace, plus I really like him on a personal level, but his poor performance is now causing problems for me and others.

You're just not educated on the matter.

Yes, both men and women are needed in ivf appointments, because not all cases are the same. For example, there is such a thing like male infertility... It's not always the female's problem, or about single women in their 40s trying to create a family (I am one of them).

I actually work from home, and do site visits when needed and go for some meetings. Talking about IVF, infertility and fertiity treatments is not easy, and it's something very personal. I've told HR about it when I decided to move along with IVF, but I would feel violated if I learned they spoke about it to my clients... It's a personal medical issue. If you have the relationship with him that he feels comfortable to share this with you, mentioning something to you could be good, but "putting people on the spot", is really not the way to go.

HR, my coworkers, superiors, and also the team I manage have been really supportive of me, and it does help me stay productive and stable.

You do not need you dp with you at every appointment for ivf EVEN if he has fertility problems. Some people like it but it certainly isn’t necessary or the sign of a more loving partner or more invested aspiring father.

Forget about the IVF. It's not relevant.

You are paying for a service - is he providing that service? Is it delayed, shit, or both?

IVF can be a difficult emotional journey. So can parenthood.

If he's not performing well now, you need to raise it, as it's not going to get any better without intervention. As you're the client and not the employer, it's not your responsibility to explore why he's underperforming, but the people you pay should be sorting him out and/or providing you with a refund.

YANBU. There are very few appointments he needs to attend. My husband didn’t go to a single appointment aside from giving his semen due to Covid. It was fine, he wouldn’t have gone to many any way, possibly egg collection day (to drive me home). If the issue is the females fertility then he doesn’t need to be there.

At the end of the day, it seems that communication between yourselves and the agency (staff) or your other sites isn't that gerat.

How can it be that you were not notified by anyone about missed site visits?

I would work on the relationship and active communication with the agency and your
own staff.

You will find that this problem will resolve itself!

YANBU. There are very few appointments he needs to attend. My husband didn’t go to a single appointment aside from giving his semen due to Covid. It was fine, he wouldn’t have gone to many any way, possibly egg collection day (to drive me home). If the issue is the females fertility then he doesn’t need to be there
It doesn't matter if he needs to be there or not, he wants to go and his work is allowing him to go. Just because you don't think your husband would have gone with you doesn't mean every other man wouldn't want to support their partner.

My husband came to them all for our first, we were both invested in having a child.

Second baby he could only come to certain appointments with covid so I went alone to the majority. He felt quite left out of that cycle.

Prior to covid restrictions it was absolutely normal to see couples at the clinic. Partners should be encouraged to be invested in their children from the off, in my view.

Plus he might be handling the medicine doses etc. feels complex the first time you get to grips with it all.

He's taking the piss. You should ask for him to be replaced before your business suffers more.

When I had IVF my partner only came to the appointments he needed to be at (3 of them) due to having to work and both of us not wanting to cause disruption (I didn't even tell my work I was going through it). However, it can be emotionally draining so both of us were likely distracted for the month and trying to support each other emotionally. No idea if either of our employers noticed, I doubt they did as main deliverables completed.
Everyone copes with things differently and I would definitely be sympathetic of anyone TTC for a very long time (upset of this for my was I think even more distracting than the IVF!) and the treatment itself particularly since it's short term. It's good he felt comfortable enough to tell his employer, and it's great he is being so supportive to his wife.

@KosherDill

He's taking the piss. You should ask for him to be replaced before your business suffers more.

Yep, he might want paternity leave and need to take time off to look after sick children.

He might want paternity leave need time off for sick children and has shown he will just take it and not bother to tell you.